by Alen Mattich
“Fuck,” said Anzulović, pulling della Torre to the side so they were out of sight.
Della Torre nodded. “Horvat. Who’s the old man with him?”
“That, my dear Gringo, is the Dispatcher.”
Della Torre felt his legs and chest grow heavy and his tongue thicken. “The Dispatcher?” Tito’s henchman, who’d come out of retirement earlier in the year to organize the Bosnian hitmen who’d made a mess of della Torre’s elbow — a reprise of his job from the old days. Tito would say what he wanted and the Dispatcher would figure out how to do it. Often it included jailing or killing people. “But I thought he was . . . I thought he’d be . . .”
“Scared to show himself? Because he’s Belgrade’s man?”
“Yes. What the hell is he doing here? What’s he doing with Horvat? Fuck, somebody’s got a rope around my neck.”
“I suppose we’ll find out. But never underestimate the Dispatcher’s power of reinvention or his ability to survive. Remember, not only did he make it back from Goli Otok alive, but Tito gave him his job back. Some snakes just won’t die.”
The old man had been suspected of spying on Tito and was packed off to Yugoslavia’s infamous penal island in the 1960s. And then when the Croatian independence movement of the 1970s threatened to destabilize the country, Tito pulled the Dispatcher out of prison to help put down the revolt. Somehow he always survived. Not least because he was good at figuring out which way the wind was going to blow. Maybe that’s what he was doing now.
Della Torre nodded. Anzulović looked worried. But they didn’t have time to fret about what they’d just seen. Colonel Kakav had tracked them down.
“No time to take in the sights,” Kakav said, waving them towards a grouping of sofas and armchairs around a low table by a plate-glass window overlooking the square. “We have people to talk to.”
Kakav wore a new double-breasted navy-blue suit. But because he was on the short side and carrying too much weight around the middle, with a neck to match, it looked borrowed. He had on a pewter-coloured tie, which he wore loose. He’d undone the top button of his shirt, an off-white Communist-era number with shiny vertical stripes woven in. Any effort at looking professional was undone by a polyester slobbishness. With an odd combination of smug self-satisfaction and nervous anticipation, he bounced on the balls of his feet as he herded the men to the chairs.
“Wait here while I tell the deputy minister that you’ve arrived,” he said, intending to exert authority but instead sounding wheedling.
Della Torre caught Anzulović’s eye. The thought passed between them: how had this man ever managed to rise above traffic warden? Then again, Kakav was utterly convinced of his own competence and abilities. So while smarter people laughed, his bosses kept giving him more responsibility, and then promoted him elsewhere when they discovered their mistake.
They didn’t wait long before Horvat strode over with Kakav in tow. The Dispatcher hadn’t accompanied them.
Anzulović and della Torre stood up in unison.
“Gentlemen.” Horvat gave della Torre half a warm smile and all but ignored Anzulović.
“Congratulations on your appointment, sir,” della Torre said. Anzulović kept his peace.
“A duty. But real congratulations are in order to you, Major.” Horvat took della Torre’s hand and gave it an effusive shake.
“I’m sorry, sir, but you’re mistaken. My rank’s captain,” della Torre said.
“Oh, but —” Kakav started with what he might have supposed to be an expression of munificence, arms opened out like a priest’s.
“There’s no mistake.” Horvat cut him off, smiling that half smile. “One of the first things I did this morning was promote you. Congratulations, Major della Torre. We need good senior officers in our new army. I’m never mistaken about my people.”
“Yes, congratulations, Major,” Kakav interjected, ignored by the others as if he were just another piece of social-realist sculpture.
Della Torre wasn’t sure what to say. The promotion was so unexpected and so irrelevant that all he could do was stammer a half-hearted thanks. Anzulović, whom Horvat still hadn’t acknowledged, was a major. Whatever rank della Torre was given, he knew his place relative to Anzulović. And it wasn’t that of an equal.
“Besides, we couldn’t have a junior officer carrying out a mission of the importance we’ll be handing to you,” Horvat said, his eyes flickering behind della Torre. “Ah, here he is. Our American friend, Mr. Dawes.”
Della Torre looked over his shoulder to see a tall man approaching. He was roughly della Torre’s age, maybe a year or two younger. He wore chinos and brown loafers and had on a white button-down shirt and a blue blazer with shiny brass buttons. The man was even taller than della Torre, though he was much more well padded. His shoulders were too narrow for his broad hips, making him slightly pear-shaped and giving his legs the appearance of tree trunks.
Unlike the three men from military intelligence, neither Dawes nor Horvat wore ties.
“Forgive me for being early,” Dawes said in American English, coloured by a faint Southern accent. He had a broad smile and white teeth. “One of the disadvantages of staying in the hotel where you’re holding meetings is that you haven’t got an excuse for being late.”
Horvat laughed with Dawes. Della Torre managed to smile politely. Anzulović, whose English was rudimentary, struggled. Kakav wore the rictus grin of ignorance.
“I’m afraid the lieutenant colonel doesn’t speak much English. And I don’t think Major Anzulović is very proficient either,” Horvat said.
“That’s okay, because I don’t speak much Serbo-Croat,” Dawes said.
“Croat,” Horvat corrected.
“My apologies — Croat.” Dawes smiled indulgently. “All I can say is da, ne. And piva. I find wherever I go that once I can order myself a beer, everything else becomes infinitely easier and more pleasurable.”
He sat down, taking over most of a sofa. The others sat too.
“We will have coffee.” Horvat looked over to reception, where a stationed waiter caught his eye and came over. Behind the waiter was a photographer wearing a pair of Japanese SLRs around his neck as if they were Olympic medals. Horvat made a show of surprised annoyance.
“My apologies, gentlemen,” he said in English. “Only an hour ago my appointment is made, and press have found me already. What I can say?” He shrugged elaborately. “We will do quick photograph and then they will leave us alone. No?”
Dawes looked bemused and then slightly alarmed when Horvat put his arm over the American’s shoulders as the photographer snapped away. A stunned della Torre found his way into one of the pictures. Anzulović, who’d withdrawn into a corner of the room, found it hard to hide his disgust.
“Sit, sit, please,” said Horvat, abruptly shooing the photographer away. “Some coffees, yes?” He turned to the waiter and ordered in Croat.
“I would appreciate it if you could have a word with your photographer there,” Dawes said. “I would find it most uncomfortable to find my picture in a newspaper. I told my wife I was spending the weekend golfing in Florida.”
Della Torre smiled politely as both Dawes and Horvat laughed elaborately at the weak joke.
“Of course not. Of course not,” Horvat said, putting his hand on the American’s forearm in emphasis. “Now, about coffee . . .”
“Would you mind asking if they do American-style? I find your espressos disappear too quickly,” Dawes said. He’d held his smile throughout, though his eyes suggested he’d been as amused by the photo shoot as Anzulović.
Della Torre had taken the last chair, the one with its back to the room. He offered around his Luckys, which only Dawes refused. It was hard to turn down American cigarettes.
Anzulović and Kakav sat like a pair of lemons in a fruit bowl while Horvat and Dawes talked about the wea
ther. Della Torre watched the American. Dawes had big hands, his index finger constantly tapping out an unknown rhythm on the arm of the sofa. Smoke curled around the rest of them; Dawes didn’t seem to mind.
Della Torre didn’t contribute anything. He just sat there joining threads, spinning a story full of holes for himself. The Dispatcher knew things, knew about plenty of skeletons from the Communist times. It would make sense for Horvat to want to know him. For his part, the Dispatcher would want the world — no, della Torre — to know that he was under a powerful man’s protection. This made sense. The American? He couldn’t have looked more government if he’d been an eagle holding a clutch of arrows, right off the cover of della Torre’s secret passport. Croatia wanted American friends. Hell, everybody wanted American friends. And here was an American friend. Della Torre struggled to figure out his own part in it. Other than having grown up in Ohio, he couldn’t think of what might tie him to Mr. Dawes. Showing Americans that there were people in Zagreb who spoke their language just like they did? It seemed too far-fetched.
He was lost in thought when he suddenly noticed the silence. What conversation there was had stopped and the others were looking in his direction. Not at him, but rather somewhere over his left shoulder. He followed their gaze, turning in his chair to see a striking redhead.
Rebecca.
She stood there smiling like a diplomat at a reception. She wore a well-tailored business suit with a linen blouse cut low enough to subtly show off her breasts. Her hair was pinned back in a bun, though a few strands had come loose to frame her face. She wore a vermilion lipstick that gave her lips a seductive glow. Somehow it heightened the girlishness of the freckles across the bridge of her nose, which had been brought out by the Istrian sun.
“Rebecca,” he said, jumping to his feet, embarrassed and taken by surprise. “It’s great to see you. I thought you’d disappeared completely. I’m afraid I’m in a meeting right now. Maybe I can see you later?”
She touched her cheek to his, blowing a kiss just past his ear.
“Marko,” she said, and then walked past him to Dawes.
“Would you make the introductions, John?” she said. “I hope I’m not too late. My run was longer than I’d expected. I got a little lost.”
“Not at all,” Dawes said. “We were just discussing how the heat’s not too bad so long as it doesn’t get humid. Anyway, you know the major already. This is Deputy Defence Minister Horvat. And this is Lieutenant Colonel Kakav, and Major Anz . . .”
“Anzulović,” Anzulović said, bowing slightly to disguise the faintly amused look in his eyes.
“And this is my colleague Rebecca Vees. Now that she’s here, maybe we can start,” Dawes said.
Della Torre made an effort to keep his mouth shut so that he wouldn’t gawp like the fish he was. It was the third time she’d caught him completely off guard. Rebecca made herself comfortable on the sofa, next to Dawes. The waiter brought their coffees and a bottle of clear spirit and five shot glasses. Rebecca ordered a glass of mineral water.
“Our American friends wish for some help,” Horvat started, “and we would like to help them.” He turned to Dawes. “What you ask for, we will try to do. And if we cannot do it, we will try harder.”
“That is very kind of you, Minister,” Dawes said, smiling. “First, I’d just like to make clear that we are here informally. We don’t represent anyone. But to the extent that we have the ears of Washington, we will let people know how helpful you’ve been. And make every effort to ensure that they do something for you in return.”
Della Torre drew on his cigarette until the ash threatened to fall onto his lap, and then crushed the butt in a cut-glass ashtray. His attention was focused on Rebecca, his mind forcing together bits of two different puzzles. Nothing quite fitted, though he knew that somewhere among all the scattered pieces was the picture of a man drowning in his own ignorance. A man who looked an awful lot like della Torre.
He looked over to Kakav and felt a ripple of sympathy for the apparatchik, sitting there in his blue suit with his pasted-on grin, fathoms below the surface of any understanding.
“As you can appreciate, we won’t go into detail here,” Dawes continued. “But if the major is happy to take on the assignment, my colleague here will brief him separately.”
All eyes turned to della Torre. For a moment he couldn’t understand why. Anzulović was the major. But then he remembered his promotion.
“I have complete confidence Major della Torre will do everything he can,” Horvat said, breaking the silence.
“Yes. Yes, of course,” della Torre said.
“Then it is agreed.” Horvat filled the shot glasses from the clear bottle. They were one glass short, and Horvat made sure Anzulović was the one left out. “So we drink to this friendship. The major and the beautiful miss.”
He laughed, then raised his glass and threw back the slivovitz. Della Torre saw that the Americans barely touched their lips to the liquid, leaving full glasses on the table. If Horvat noticed, he didn’t betray it.
As they rose to leave, Rebecca stepped towards della Torre and rested her fingers on his forearm, holding him back.
“Let’s go upstairs,” she said. “I have a nice suite. We can talk.”
Della Torre nodded. He was starting to realize that he was little more than an automaton, there to be programmed and then set into motion. It was like being back in the commandos. Of course it was. He was in the army now.
As they passed the front desk on the way to the elevators, della Torre caught sight of the Dispatcher sitting in a large winged chair, contemplating him with a beatific smile.
Della Torre and Rebecca took the elevator up to her suite in silence. Its sitting room was tired, like much of the hotel, but nevertheless it was spacious and had extravagant views of Zagreb Cathedral’s double spire and, far beyond it, the low, forested ridge of mountains to the north. Della Torre took the armchair by the window.
“Can I get you a drink?” she asked.
“No. Care to explain yourself?”
“You’re a smart guy. What explanation do you need?”
“They sent me to my father’s so that you could inspect me. I suppose I passed.”
“You passed.”
“Couldn’t you do that in Zagreb? Why did you need to involve Dad?”
“Why do you think?”
“Because you wanted as much background as possible before meeting me.”
“We like to be thorough.”
“Who’s ‘we’?” He knew. Or close enough. Whether it was the CIA or a branch of U.S. military intelligence hardly mattered. It made no difference to him. Croatia was desperate to do what it could for the Americans, and hopeful of favours in return.
She moved off her perch on the arm of her chair and helped herself to a bottle of clear soda from the mini-bar, examining the label before opening it. “Inka . . . What is it?”
“Tonic water,” he said.
“Oh. Maybe not.”
“I’ll have some, then.”
“Thought you weren’t thirsty,” she said.
“Maybe it’ll get the bitter taste out of my mouth.”
She gave him a sideways glance and opened the bottle. She poured him the drink, helping herself to a diet Coke instead.
The Inka was tepid.
“What we need is to talk to someone called Petar Djilas. He worked for the UDBA but is retired now.”
Della Torre paused. Djilas. The Montenegrin.
“You want his phone number?” della Torre asked, taking out a cigarette.
“I wish you wouldn’t smoke in here,” she said.
He lit it anyway.
“We’ve got his phone number,” she continued, not pressing the issue. “And his address too. We’d like to see him and have a little chat.”
“Call him up a
nd make an appointment.”
“We’d love to do that, but we have it on good authority he wouldn’t be interested in talking to strangers.”
“And what do you want to talk to him about?”
“Some of the people he killed. In the States.”
“I don’t think he actually killed anyone in the U.S. He ran some teams that did, but he never pulled the trigger.”
“We’re interested anyway.”
“Well, in that case, I can tell you for nothing that Djilas only ever did what he was ordered to do. I’ve investigated him a few times. Now, the American government may not like what he was doing — I don’t like what he was doing — but he was doing what the Yugoslav presidency told him to do. Take it up with Belgrade, not Mr. Djilas, who executed his job exactly within the limits of Yugoslav law.”
She watched him with a patient smile. Her lips were slightly parted and her eyes told him she was something other than just amused by him.
“Marko, all we want to do is ask him a few questions about what went on.”
“There’s a good chance I’ve got my notes on those operations. You probably know that my job was to investigate old UDBA assassinations. I kept my notes. Against the rules, but I’ve got them. Why don’t I give you what I’ve got, and then you don’t need to bother the Montenegrin.”
“The Montenegrin?”
“It’s what we called — call — Mr. Djilas,” he said. “Montenegro is where he’s from. The black mountains, down south. Where he lives now. In a place that’s like a fortress.”
“We’d like to talk to him because what we want won’t be on file.”
File. It made della Torre think of the tangle he’d tied himself into. It had started with the Pilgrim file, something about nuclear centrifuges that had involved the Montenegrin. The file that had somehow led the Dispatcher to send the Bosnian killers after him. And now for some reason the Montenegrin had entangled della Torre with these Americans. Did this have something to do with Pilgrim too?
There wouldn’t be any budging her. Somebody further up the chain had presented her and her friend Dawes with a job, and she was doing it. He understood that.
